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Patrick K. Oden, Attorney at Law

Biography

I was born in Minneapolis and raised in Shoreview, Minnesota. When I was young, my mother was hospitalized with rheumatoid arthritis, and my grandmother cared for myself and my younger brother for several months. My mother returned to us a little more fragile than when she left. As a child, I was constantly concerned with her care and safety. When my father was once constructing or repairing the roof of our home, my mother was climbing around on the rooftop while my father was shingling. I screamed my five-year-old head off telling my mother that she must immediately come down. I was afraid for her.

At an even earlier age, perhaps when I was four years old, my mother was having difficulty breathing. I dialed the emergency number, and the paramedics rushed to my mother’s aid and to my great relief. I am surprised I knew what to do, at such a tender age. My parents taught me well, in that and all other areas of my childhood.

I attended private schools from elementary school through college. My parents wanted me to have the best education they could afford. I am forever grateful for their sacrifice to support my education. Without their efforts, I am certain I would not be where I am today. I attended Saint Odilia Elementary and Middle School, Totino-Grace High School, and started and finished at Saint John’s University (with a few courses at a couple of other colleges in between).

I was a Boy Scout throughout my teenage years. I made the Order of the Arrow, and I obtained the final rank of Eagle Scout. My Eagle project was to collect thousands of eyeglasses that would be refit with lenses and distributed to persons who could not afford eyeglasses.

My years at Saint John’s University were some of the most memorable of my life. My undergraduate experience was generally like that of most others, though a scant eight of my graduating class had majored in philosophy, which, I suspect, gave us an rare perspective on our shared college experience. We were taught to think broadly, deeply, and critically. While many disciplines also do so, they usually do as a supplement to substantive, technical, or scientific knowledge. The philosophers are taught very little substantive material—perhaps none at all. We were not required to know anything. We were required to be able to construct, deconstruct, analyze, synthesize, and solve any problem presented to us. Philosophy is less about answering the unanswerable questions of life, such as “what is the meaning of life,” and more about learning how to think about, and engage in a meaningful way, the world around us.

After graduating from college, I held an odd assortment of jobs. I worked as a clerk at a liquor store. I was a call-center order fulfiller for Deluxe Corporation. I was a starving (figuratively) artist. Eventually, I had enough, and I enrolled in graduate school at Metropolitan State University. There I studied the art and science of rhetoric and advanced technical editing and writing and I studied the art of public administration. I worked for a (now former) U.S. Congressman. I then worked as an administrator for the Minneapolis City Attorney’s Office. These two jobs, plus significant involvement in a lawsuit my grandmother waged against my late-grandfather’s cousins, convinced me that my immediate and proper path of study must be the law. I applied to law schools before I finished graduate school. I was accepted to several and chose the School of Law at the University of Pittsburgh. Though Pitt Law has slipped in recent years, at the time the program was a well-respected nationally-recognized legal education. I must admit, the main reason I chose Pitt was the scholarship they awarded to me.

I spent approximately three years in Pittsburgh. There I made close and lifelong friends. I learned a lot of legal theory. And I even learned a bit about how to be a lawyer, though that last comes more from the practical experience of practicing as a lawyer. Law school teaches its students about the whys and wherefores of law without doing so much to teach about how to be a lawyer.

I finished law school in May of 2005 and earned a doctorate of law, and I took and passed the July 2005 bar exam in Minnesota. I have practiced here, in Minnesota, ever since. Additionally, I have worked as a legal editor for West Publishing and as a legal editor for the Minnesota State Bar Association. I have also returned to Metro State to finish the master of science degree in rhetoric and technical writing. I am currently working on my thesis, and with enough time and effort, I will be done with this degree during summer 2009.